Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)First of all, those Juice Rechargeable Alkaline Batteries cannot be recharged using ordinary NiMH chargers - not even the Juice Battery Family Charger. You need either a special-purpose alkaline charger, or a multi-chemistry charger that can handle both NiMH and Rechargeable Alkaline Manganese (RAM) cells. For examples:
- Juice Multi-Battery Charger Kit, and
- Rayovac PS3 Universal Battery Charger (now discontinued)
On first glance, the concept of rechargeable alkaline cell sounds great, since it combines advantages from both ordinary alkaline cell (long shelf life, 1.5V terminal voltage) and rechargeable cell (multi-use). Unfortunately, it also inherited the biggest limitation of alkaline cell: high internal resistance. This makes it very inefficient when used in high-drain appliances such as digital camera or flash light. So it is only suitable for low-drain appliances such as wireless mouse, remote control, or smoke detector.
CAPACITY:
The manufacturer claims that a new Juice AA RAM cell has capacity of 2000mAh (tested with discharge current of 50mA down to 0.8V at 22 degree C). My own measurement using the La Crosse BC-900 has shown an average capacity of only 1440mAh (tested with 100mA down to 0.9V at 17 degree C). In comparison, the Duracell alkaline AA cell under identical test conditions provided 2220mAh, or 50% higher capacity! Worse yet, capacity of Juice RAM cell drops further with each deep-discharge cycle. After five more charge/discharge cycles, its remaining capacity is only around 1000mAh.
LIFESPAN:
Product description claims Juice RAM cells can 'recharge and reuse up to 100 times'. But this is very misleading, because it can only be achieved if you shallow-discharge (discharge no more than 25% of capacity) the cell every time. That means you have to remove the cell and recharge it very frequently, before the low-battery indicator ever comes up. In comparison, a typical NiMH cell is rated for 500 deep-discharge cycles.
RELIABILITY:
I have eight of those Juice RAM cells stored in a box after testing. After about one year of storage, three of them leaked electrolyte badly through the negative terminals. Good thing they were not being used in appliances. In contrast, none of my name brand low-self-discharge rechargeable cells have failed on me.CONCLUSION:
In my opinion, it is just not worth the trouble to 'baby-sit' those rechargeable alkaline cells, especially since you can easily buy low-self-discharge NiMH cells (such as SANYO eneloop AA or Sony Pre-Charged AA) instead.
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